"However, I found little or no evidence of racial hatred in the interviews I conducted. Morever, the people heaped praise on King's legacy - or at least on part of it. They loved his call to judge people not by race, but by personal qualities. In contrast, they didn't want to talk about his support for social justice...'We are here to honor Martin Luther King's legacy. He believed it wasn't about skin color, that it's about the content of your character, honesty, integrity, hard work, care for your family..."
WTF. Saying MLK's legacy is not about race and social justice is like saying that the Holocaust had nothing to do with Jews.
Beck has managed to steal MLK's legacy for White people, who feel they are the victims of entitlements and perks for Blacks. The subtext of the quote above is that if skin color doesn't matter, than Whites would be doing better -- because they value character, honesty, integrity, hard work, care for the family, etc...Beck and those attending his White Fest have managed in one afternoon to completely twist MLK's words to justify their own racism, and perserve their own sense of privilege. He has managed to take a message of unity and use it to further promote division.
Of course, those in attendance would heap praise on MLK's legacy. Because through Beck, they managed to pick and choose portions of MLK's vision to support their own ends. Of course those in attendance would refer to part of a speech that said "...to judge people not by the color of their skin..." By choosing that small part of a larger speech, the implicit message of the day was that if organized, Whites can reclaim their position in society, and MLK would agree.
Nice post Annie, and spot on!!
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